Trentonian editorial: Uh, what election?

The Prez is strictly a respectable family man, boringly so. He’s about as far from being a party animal as you can imagine. Not even the fevered right-wingers who think he’s a Muslim commie suggest otherwise.

The point we’re getting at is a key demographic that helped propel him to the presidency last time around — the 18 to 29 set — is described by pollsters as being “disengaged” this time.

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Young voters, it seems, have more urgent matters on their minds than politics. The opposite sex, to name one. Where the awesome parties are going to be tonight, to name another — and not, of course, the political parties, which are anything but awesome.

When not fixated on matters along these lines, the 18-29 cohort is worrying about jobs and, if they went to college, paying off a colossal debt now surpassing $1 trillion total to the bastions of liberal propaganda, otherwise known as “higher education.”

The 2008 election was an exception for this young demographic. A fantastic new political phenom had come on the scene — a man of nimble intelligence, mellifluous voice and pigmented skin. He was going to heal the planet and stop the seas from rising upon moving into the White House. Awesome! Merely the act of taking the oath merited a Nobel Peace Prize.

Now, the pollsters are telling us, the young adult demographic is dwelling in The Land of Disenchantment. While still lopsidedly in favor of Obama, this demographic’s interest in the election has plummeted. Turns out jobs couldn’t simply be created by government regulatory decree, and peace couldn’t be spread merely by voicing noble sentiment.

The pollsters of the Pew Research Center say interest in the election among the 18-to-29 group is down a full 17 percentage points from 2008. And the number of those who say they’ll definitely vote is down 9 percentage points.

So the Nov. 6 outcome may depend more on getting supporters to the polls than spouting factoids in debates. Can the Obama campaign get these young adults to the polls? Let’s face it, telling them the economy is improving slowly but surely lacks the motivational pizzazz of offering them, like, truly awesome hope and change.

And if the Obama campaign can get them to the polls, will they be able to vote? When the Pew Poll asked those under 30 whether they’re registered, the answer from fully one-half was, in effect: “Uh...um....uh....dunno.”

Who at that age has time to deal with political trivia when there are urgent, important issues to address? Bet you something like to 90 percent could tell you where the awesome parties (non-political) with the opposite-sex hotties are tonight.

All of which explains, by the way, how the geezers, apart from their numbers, became a formidable voting bloc.